May 8: "Finding Strength Beyond my own"

First off  -  THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU to all of you for your fasting and prayers and your thoughts! Really, I can feel the hand of the Lord helping me through this trial and I can feel all your love radiating from home! Million thank yous for all of you! Really it means the world to me to have such amazing people as an influence in my life! YOU`RE ALL AWESOME!!!

So, a little update on what happened this week. On Tuesday I went to the doctor and they still aren`t quite sure what is going on. They put me on a bunch of pills and a strict diet of NO wheat (bread, noodles, flour etc.) and NO dairy (milk, yogurt, ice cream, butter etc.) so I’m kinda stuck here eating veggies. ha-ha nothing more. it`s a little difficult but at least he didn`t say I couldn`t drink Coke!!! After they told me they want to do further tests to really figure out the problem. On Thursday I got my blood drawn ..... and for those of you that know me I HATE BLOOD!!!! I was so nervous and freaking out cause every time I’ve gotten my blood drawn before, I’ve passed out. This week wasn`t an exception. I was hyper ventilating before they even stuck the needle in! ha-ha the mission nurse had come with me and helped me a bunch but ya. I passed out. Afterwards the nurse was telling me that I went so white and I wasn`t making sense in what I was saying! After they gave me a lollipop and we walked out to go meet the other sisters that were waiting for us. They started laughing at me cause I wasn`t making any sense ha-ha but we went and got some French fries. I was weird and dizzy the rest of the day and I still have a bruise from where the needle was! But now I can check that off my Bucket List -  ¨Get Blood Drawn in Foreign Country¨ CHECK  - ¨Pass out in Foreign Country¨ CHECK

I'm getting to know the mission nurse, Hermana Lett, really well

Like 3 mins after I came too after passing out

 Now we`re just waiting for the results to come. But with the diet I’m on and the pills I’m taking I am feeling better. Good enough to leave and work more! It`s crazy cause there`s sometimes where I barely have strength to get out of bed, but I’m so stir crazy in our apartment, I tell my companion I’m fine and we leave to work. When we`re out in the streets working, I CAN`T FEEL A THING! I`m able to work and talk to people and teach and not have the pain as a distraction. But the second I enter the apartment, I feel it all again. I know that the Lord is helping me and that all my prayers and your prayers are being answered because I can really feel the Lord supporting and helping me day after day fulfill my calling as his servant! 

This week in my studies I was reading about Moses and the house of Israel when they left Egypt. What a miracle!!! Something that I had never noticed before was that every time there was a different plague on the people of Egypt, the Pharaoh came to Moses and said ¨I`m sorry I’m sorry I will let your people go it you stop the plague¨ so Moses speaks with God and the plague is stopped. And just like we all know, Pharaoh still doesn`t let the people go. Then after they are finally set free and they come to the edge of the Red Sea, the house of Israel is filled with gratitude! But the moment they see the armies of Pharaoh coming to kill them, they begin to murmur and blame Moses. They say that it would`ve been better if Moses would`ve left them all in Egypt to work for Pharaoh than to be freed and then killed by the army. How interesting that in so little time, the people of the Lord that had just been giving thanks for the blessings they had received and the miracles they had seen, turn against their prophet. How often do we do this? We turn on our leaders, our bishops, our General Authorities, or even our Heavenly Father and say that it`s because of them that we are suffering. 

I challenge each of you to make it your personal goal to, through EVERY circumstance, look for the blessings of the Lord and maybe even the hidden miracles that are happening every day. The moment that we can have that humility and gratitude in our hearts ALWAYS is when we are really going to become disciples of Christ. 

I love love love you all!! 

have one amazing week okay?

Hermana Smoot

One of the little kitties of a member 

Yummy cookie baking!  Yes that's right I was cooking and I didn't burn them!!! #MIRACLE

May 1: Short and Sick

      This week there´s really not much to tell. I´ve gotten pretty sick these past couple days which has forced us to be in the apartment a lot. The problems I´ve been having have gotten more and more serious even with the medications I´ve been taking. Tomorrow I´m going to the doctor and getting some tests done to see what it could be. We´re pretty sure it has something to do with my intestines but hopefully we can find a way to fix whatever I´ve got. But it´s all just even more of a motivation to work harder with the time when I do feel good enough to leave the apartment!

      This week with the little time we had, found a new investigator named Gabriela. She has listened to the missionaries before and her sister is an active member in the neighboring branch! We entered her house and she ran into her room and walked out with a Book of Mormon, sat down and told us that she knows the church is true and that she loves the Book of Mormon!! I about fell over dead! haha The problem is with her husband and her 2 sons. They don´t like the church and refuse that she goes. Every time we have a lesson with her it´s when no one else is home because she doesn´t want to cause problems in her family. She cried as she expressed her problems to us and told us how bad she wants to be baptized! We´re working a lot with her to help her introduce the topic of the church to her husband and maybe inviting her whole family to a church activity. She´s amazing!! We set the goal with her to read the Book of Mormon every day with a question in mind of how she can help her family come closer to the church. I´m really excited for her! We´re gonna get her baptized!

      I´m sorry this letter is so short but I love you all and I hope you have a successful week! 

hermana smoot